The invention relates generally to vending machines and particularly to those directed to dispensing newspapers to customers who deposit the appropriate combination of coins. More specifically, the invention is directed to dispensing single copies of newspapers and the like.
Vending machines are widely known to the public for almost every kind of merchandise, food and beverage imaginable. Dispensers for various articles are well known in which the customer inserts coins into a slot or channel and either by electrical apparatus, or a mechanical totalizer, counting the change an article is dispensed. Usually packaged items, beverage cans, and the like, can be dispensed one at a time from racks inside a machine and devices accomplishing this end are well known in the art. Heretofore however, vending machines capable of dispensing a single copy of a newspaper, or other flat-type publications, require manual adjustments for dispensing different sized newspapers and are not self-adjusting.
An outmoded lock box with a swing out door is the usual and predominant type of newspaper vending device that the consumer encounters at street corners, train stations, airport terminals, lobbies of buildings and an infinite number of other environments. Typically the newspaper reader deposits the appropriate amount of coins, such as twenty-five cents for a daily paper, and a mechanical door lock is disengaged so that the customer may swing the unlocked door open, reach into the receptacle or box, and extract a paper. With these devices, the honor system is required. Obviously, the unscrupulous may fall prey to ulterior motives and accumulate more than one copy of the newspaper to sell for themselves. Such thievery results in financial loss to the newspaper distributor or newspaper truck driver, who buys papers at wholesale and is remunerated by collecting the coins held in a collection box within the vending device. The standard lock boxes are also subject to vandalism due to the easy access they provide.
Because of the expected loss of up to 20% to 40% in certain urban environments plagued by high crime rate, fewer copies of a newspaper are put into the present day vending boxes then they are capable of holding in order to reduce losses per box. The supply is usually sold quickly in the early morning hours. The honest consuming public is thereby cheated of the opportunity to have convenient access to newspapers at many locations.
The use of the conventional vending machines for newspapers magazines, publications, and the like, also inconveniently require the patron to open a door, stoop over, and then reach into the box to extract the newspaper. Compared with obtaining, for example, a can of carbonated beverage from a vending machine, or a package of cigarettes from a cigarette vending machine, the present day newspaper vending devices are anachronisms.
It would be desirable for the newspaper distributing industry to provide a vending machine that dispenses only a single copy of a newspaper, or other flattened-like, or folded, printed publications, at a time to the public in an easy-to-operate manner for the customer.
It is a related object of the invention to provide a single copy vending machine that is theft resistant.
It is further an allied goal of the invention to provide a single copy vending machine which may be quickly and safely loaded with a new supply of newspapers with an interior storage capacity that is significantly larger than the number of newspapers that conventional swingout door boxes can hold.
It is also an object to dispense the newspapers horizontally at a convenient height to the customer. In this regard it is desirable to provide a spring loaded tray interiorly of a housing forming the storage portion, onto which a full, heavy load of papers is held to be singly dispensed. It is therefore a concomitant objective to allow for intermittent stops during loading whereby the delivery person can safely lock the spring loaded tray at intermittent levels during loading for safety and ease of restocking the device with both hands free.
It is an important object of the invention to provide an easy pull-push handle means for dispensing a single copy of a newspaper upon the insertion of the correct number of coins into a coin accepter and totalizer device.
It is an allied goal of the invention to dispense the single copy of a newspaper outwardly of an access opening to the device for which an anti-theft means is associated in the form of a sliding inner trap door provided to prevent the theft and the subsequent loss of revenue caused by a thief gaining access to the storage portion.
It is also an object of the invention to provide a means cooperative with a conventional coin acceptor mechanism whereby to return any inserted coins to the customer when the device has been emptied of its last copy of the newspaper. It is a conjunctive goal to provide a linkage assembly system from the pull-push handle to the anti-theft mechanism and the coin loss prevention means as an overall system operated by the handle movement.
It is an important object of the invention to provide a brake lock mechanism for a spring loaded paper shelf, or product tray, that may advance copies of a newspaper into position for vending one at a time while locking the spring advancing means spaced at increments so that a next copy is appropriately positioned relative to an ejector mechanism to accommodate the size of the copy of the newspaper next to be dispensed. It is a closely related object to divise a self-adjusting brake mechanism which allows for the dispensing of a single copy of any thickness and wherein copies of various thicknesses may be vended from the device without modification whereby the brake lock mechanism self-adjusts to thickness differences.
It is a key goal of the invention to provide an ejector mechanism cooperative with a pull-push handle manipulated by the customer, which pulls a copy of the purchased newspaper outwardly of the vending device. It is a related object to provide an ejector mechanism which self-adjusts to surface variations and distortions common in a stack of newspapers whereby to accommodate such distortions and smoothly dispense copies with uneven arrangements.
To provide for the prevention of theft, it is an important goal to provide a door mechanism that is mechanically linked to the pull-push handle whereby to open a sliding trap door as the customer pulls the handle following insertion of the coins in order to permit the newspaper to be dispensed outwardly from the paper tray through a delivery slot through the housing for the device. Then, the trap door moves to abut a surface of the newspaper as it is pulled out by spring loaded means and, upon the full extension of the newspaper from the system, the door fully closes off the delivery slot. In a single copy vending system it would also be desirable to provide for means to quickly change the system to operate and vend differently priced newspapers, such as Sunday editions versus daily. It is accordingly an allied goal of the invention to provide for an adjustable linkage to a sensing assembly that associates with a mechanical coin totalizer interiorly of the device which senses the incremental advances of the totalizer and is linked to a locking mechanism for the pull-push handle. Of course, it would be desirable for the handle to not operate until the number of coins at the particular adjustment have been inserted then sensed by the sensing assembly at the totalizer and thus unlocking the system. It would be desirable to provide for the adjustment to the sensing assembly to unlock the handle at different coin amounts whereby the brake lock mechanism, ejector mechanism, anti-theft door, and coin accepting and totalizing system, are driven by the handle action as a single system when the correct number of coins are inserted and sensed by the sensing assembly.
All the foregoing objectives have been achieved and the problems in the prior art solved by the single copy vending machine invention disclosed herein. The invention may be summarized as comprising a spring loaded paper tray that is connected at pulleys by cables to a spring means, and wherein one cable takeup pulley assembly is provided with gear teeth for meshing with a brake gear on a pivoting brake arm so that the paper tray can be locked at incremental vertical advances for dispensing copies of newspapers one at a time. The brake arm is attached to a shaft carrying a wheel that senses the rear edge of a dispensing copy, then rolls off the trailing edge of the newspaper and lands on the surface of the next paper. The brake arm then pivots and unlocks the brake gear. The tray is urged upwardly to contact the wheel, pivot the brake arm and re-engage the brake gear to position the next copy ready to be dispensed, while preventing further upward advancement of the tray. A pull-push handle is linked to an ejector mechanism movably mounted on a shaft and including paper engaging means in the form of spring-held needles for piercing and then pulling a copy of a newspaper outwardly through an access slot in a housing for the system.
The pull-push handle is also linked to an actuator plate mechanically linked to a coin acceptor and totalizer mechanism, which is unlocked by the insertion of the correct amount of coins. The coins cause the rotation of a shaft of the acceptor which turns a cam means arranged therewith to a certain orientation detected by a vertical sensing member. The sensing member drops into a cam notch and unlocks a horizontal sensing arm carried by the actuator plate. The actuator plate is movably arranged with a dog and ratchet. The outward pull movement also drives a means for opening an inner anti-theft trap door so that upon subsequently pushing inwardly on the handle the ejecting means pulls out a copy of a newspaper past the opened anti-theft trap door and outwardly of the housing through a preferably hinged weatherproof door covering the access slot to be grasped by the reader.
The invention also includes a system for preventing the loss of coins when there are no more papers to be dispensed. Carried by the spring loaded paper tray is a coin lock bracket which moves upwardly to contact a coin deflector mechanism arranged with the coin acceptor. Upon reaching an elevation corresponding to dispensing the last newspaper, the coin lock bracket urges against a rod that is attached to a pivotally mounted and spring biased deflector plate which has fingers that are then moved into the coin slots of the coin acceptor, such as for nickles, dimes and quarters, and deflects them from the slots outwardly to the coin return slot so that the next customer is not cheated.
For ease of filling by the newspaper truck driver or distributor, a spring loaded lockout arm and lockout lever mechanism is arranged with a cable pulley at one side of the paper tray to engage ratchet-like teeth cut from pulley sideplates of a pulley wrap hub so that as the tray is moved downwardly during reloading the lockout arm engages at each ratchet location to prevent pulley rotation so that the tray does not dangerously snap upwardly and so that the tray may be moved downwardly in steps for loading a few of the newspapers at a time in order to allow the person to freely use both hands.
The lockout mechanism may be disengaged by the person pushing against the spring tension that holds the lockout lever against the ratchet teeth or by closure of the housing outer door which includes actuating means in positional correspondence with the lockout arm to push against the lockout arm and disengage the ratchet of the pulley side plates so that the wrap hub associating therebetween is freely rotatable due to the pressure of the paper tray springs that pull on the cable and spring load the tray for upward advancement of the system.
A pulley shaft connects opposing pulley wrap hubs-one being associated with the brake lock mechanism and the other with the safety lockout mechanism and each being associated with a cable that is connected to the shelf. Outward along the shaft from one of the opposing pulley wrap hubs a third cable wrap hub is provided for receiving cable thereover fed over a pulley sheave to connect to helical paper tray tension springs below which when are tensed as the tray is loaded downwardly and thus biases the tray toward upward advancement. The tray carries wheel means slidingly located in roller channels of a frame for the vending system for facilitating a smooth stable vertical tray movement.
The single copy vending system allows for adaption to an outer housing having the anti-theft trap door arranged at the inner side of hinged door that is unlocked by the newspaper distributing employee for loading the tray with the products and collection of the coins. The system allows for the accommodation of large numbers of newspapers since by virtue of the single dispensing capability the vendor may put greater numbers of copies into vending devices at locations which otherwise are subject to a high rate of theft. The actuator plate driven by the handle and the coin deflector means are mountable with conventional coin acceptors and totalizer mechanisms by the provision of a housing means formed to support the coin acceptor and totalizer therein and accommodate the actuator plate, coin sensing and unlocking means, and a movable shaft. The shaft passes inwardly of the housing to move a pivotable spring biased plate attached to the exterior of the coin acceptor and totalizer. The coin deflector plate includes coin deflector fingers arranged to extend inwardly of coin acceptor coin pathways so that when the coin deflector plate is pivoted the fingers rotated provide barriers to the normal pathways of the coins to deflect them to the return slot.
A cam means suitable for attachment to the rotating shaft of a coin totalizer is movably arranged with a vertical detector or sensing means so that when the appropriate number of coins are inserted the rotating shaft turns a cam notch to a predetermined position at which the vertical sensing means drops into the cam notch thereby unlocking a slide plate to be driven by the handle movement for operating the system to dispense a single newspaper.